Hi everyone. It’s Bonnie here today stepping in for Barb for Week 13 of the Art Journal Adventure. Barb is up to her eyebrows in things to do so I jumped at the chance to step in. The prompt this week is Home whether it’s a human one, an animal or insect home, or just a feeling of being at home and comfortable. Homes can take so many different forms…sometimes it’s who you are with that makes you feel and think of home.

My page started with a 7 x 10 inch rectangle of watercolour paper because I knew I would be using ink sprays on my background and I wanted the effect that watercolour paper gives. I grabbed a piece of torn card stock. layered it over the watercolour paper about 1 to 1.5 inches from the bottom, torn side toward the bottom and covering the sky area. I then spritzed the grass area with Lindy’s Drop Dead Gorgeous Green and Cathedral Pine Green Two Toned Starburst Sprays.

I repeated the process at the top of the page angling the torn edge once I got to the second layer from the top and alternated Lindy’s Sassy Sapphire and Delphinium Turquoise Starburst Sprays with each layer. The white piece of card stock was used to protect the rest of the page so that I was only spraying between the two papers.

When I began each layer, I tried to get close to the one above but white spaces were evident between each layer because of the curves of the torn edge. That was OK because I had a plan.

A black Fine Pitt Pen was used to outline the sections and emphasize the openings.

I switched to a Super Fine Pitt Pen to doodle designs inside those openings and make them part of the design. Love it!

I always have scraps of decorated papers from mopping up ink overspray, from gel printing, and from using up extra paints or ink on stamps. I decided to stamp Stampotique Originals Home Sweet Home house using Jet Black Archival Ink onto some of those papers. I used one for the main part of the house, another for the roof and door, and a third for the windows. All were fussy cut and the house and roof were matted with black. Foam tape was used to pop them up.

The windows were covered in Glossy Accents to create a shine like glass and the roof dots were covered in Glam Pink Stickles. A little black rhinestone was used for the doorknob.

The sun was punched from paper with a resist pattern on it and again from black card stock. The sun was inked with Scattered Straw and Spiced Marmalade Distress Inks and then offset with the black circle to create a shadow.

A tree was stamped with Jet Black Archival Ink onto some mop-up paper I used to clean up the extra ink from the background spraying. I always keep pre-cut ATCs on my desk for that purpose. The tree was fussy cut and then adhered slightly behind the house. Clouds were die cut from old book text and then white gesso was used to knock back the print a little. Once dry, the edges were inked with black ink and a border was doodled on each.

I found the sprayed background a little plain for my taste so I added some tone on tone stamping using Joggles Nonsense Latin Text and Fern Green Archival Ink on the green section and Joggles Background Noise Sparks and Forget-Me-Not Archival Ink on the sky. I also added a little path to the front door with a scrap of corrugated cardboard.

The sentiment, printed on white card stock and matted with black, makes me laugh. I am an introvert and can just imagine me going through this process, all rah rah at uniting with other introverts and then realizing that it would only happen if we could all stay at home by ourselves…where we are most comfortable. Home is where I am most comfortable with my husband, my cats, and my stuff 🙂

Anyway, that’s my response to this week’s Home prompt. I am excited to see the many varied directions this prompt takes everyone in the AJA Facebook group. Remember that there is no wrong way to respond…wherever you go with it is where you are meant to go. Enjoy the process!